More on Tony's beliefs

Tony,

Where do you come up with this idea of an eternal animating force? Why not just believe in the personal Creator that the Bible reveals to us? Why go for some impersonal force? Sounds kind of Star Warsy - New Agey. How can personality and consciousness be produced by an impersonal force?

I don’t know. Sounds really far out to me, but it’s a free world.

I guess more to the point is this question: Why should anyone believe your ideas about an eternal animating force? At least believers in God have a basis for their belief and some evidence to back it up, but an eternal animating force?

Does this force know you?
Does this force place any demands on you?
Does this force communicate to you?
Does this force tell you what happens when you die?
Does this force have a plan for the future? Is it guiding the world towards something or towards nothing at all?

I’d love to hear what your beliefs are and why you think they are true.

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This is quite appropriate, since we had a Star Wars blog post today. The big question is actually: Is the force with you?

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I can accept this on the grounds that the Bible states ‘For in Him, we live and move and have our being’.

That God is not a Man but a spirit, light and the very life itself coursing through our blood.

That Christ is the embodiment of these qualities. Something for us to focus on and see.

And the Holy spirit being the way we feel and experience all of the above.

I believe it was Sayers that likened the tri-unity of God to a Book. A Book needs an idea, a writer and a physical manifestation of itself to exist and be interacted with.

But that is about as far as I will go.

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How would you ever know? What does it matter if the “force” is with you or not?

So you too are a believer in the force? (blind faith)

Question to self:

Why is it people so easily place their faith is in stuff like some impersonal “force”, but reject belief in a personal God?

Could it be perhaps because a force makes no demands on a person? I don’t know.

Usually because the evidence against a personal God is STAGGERING, but the evidence for a designer is also staggering.

@Tokyoguy111

Hi, thank you for your questions. It’s 3 A.M, I’ve had a long day, and I must call it day. I will get to answering your questions tomorrow. For now I’ll just say that that which created the universe is different from the God of Christianity.

I do believe in the personal Creator that the bible reveals to us, however, the personal Creator is just that—personal—(we all have extension to Him). On the other hand, that which created the universe is something altogether different.

Aaaaand here is why I drew the line above. I cannot agree with Tony here. The God which created the Heavens and the Earth is the same God that led the Israelites out of Egypt and the same God that died on the cross at Golgotha, rising 3 Days later.

Tony’s position as I see it is far too infused with a general New-Age/Post-modern, all-encompassing/all inclusive spirituality in the vein of re-incarnation and mediating to reach enlightenment.
As I see it, his position is un-biblical.

Benjamin, kind of reminds me of the parable where there is an elephant in the room and a bunch of blindfolded men are feeling different parts of the elephant and describing very different things. One feels the tail and describes it. The next says, “No, No, it’s not like that at all. It’s like this.” And he goes on to describe the leg. Another describes the large stomach and rib cage, another the trunk, and another the ear.

So yes, if we take one verse, - here you mentioned two - you can make a case for God being many things. But you have to take all the verses about God into consideration to get an accurate picture of who He is. The same God who is a spirit, speaks, creates, judges, loves, hates, sees, communes with, etc. etc. The God of the Bible is a personal God, not an impersonal force. If all you mean by force is that He is a spirit, then of course we agree, but I suspect you mean something different or you would not adopt that terminology.

No where are we told that God is the blood coursing through our veins. Christ most certainly is the embodiment of all of the Father’s qualities and that is seen most vividly in the fact that He is a person who can commune with, relate to, and establish relationships with others.

Cheers.

@tokyoguy111 You do realize that @beaglelady was making a joke here? You responded so seriously…

Anyway, may the Force be with you! :smile:

P.S. Don’t go to the dark side of the Force

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I never said that either. I said God is life itself. The source of the life that flows through our blood. The life is described as being in the blood remember?
If you can come up with a better origin and nature of life then I’m happy to hear it.

I accept the Biblical description of God. I believe that the Bible is the ONLY way modern Humans can learn anything about God unless He reveals Himself to us another way, which He has not.
Therefore ANYTHING to be said about God MUST be sourced from the Bible or else it is fantasy.

But they have so much more fun with their power :wink:

Sorry. Totally missed that!

Well Benjamin, I’m glad you go to the Bible to understand who God is.

However, you must be reading a different Bible than I am if you think the evidence against a personal God is staggering.

So, if you really believe that anything/everything we say about God has to be sourced in Scripture, what is the staggering evidence that leads you to this conclusion that is at odds with scholars throughout the centuries?

The fact that He has personality?
The fact that He knows us by name and tells us that eternal life is to “know Him”?
The fact that He loves us?
The fact that He gave His Son to save us?
The fact that He has a name by which He reveals Himself to us?
The fact that He communicates and communes with us and speaks to us?

How many impersonal “forces” can do that? I know of none.

Or do you sweep all that under the rug and focus on the idea that God is a spirit and therefore is impersonal?

As I said, that is like describing an elephant by feeling only it’s tail.

@Tokyoguy111

I already explained “that that which created the universe is different from the God of Christianity.” To be more precise, I should have said—a different aspect of the God of Christianity. Like the example of the different men feeling different parts of the elephant and only experiencing that specific reality (aspect).

I also said, “I do believe in the personal Creator that the bible reveals to us, however, the personal Creator is just that—personal—(we all have extension to Him).” This would be better expressed in that—we all have our personal subjective extension to Him. Then I said, “On the other hand, that which created the universe is something altogether different”—meaning that it is the universal objective all-embracing reality.

The following excerpts (there is more in the links supplied) will further accommodate any other pertinent answers to your critical questions;

Panentheism is the belief that God exists inside of everything, but is at the same time, transcendent of everything. In this type belief, God is seen as an eternal spark of all things, the Prime Mover, etc. Another possible interpretation of panentheism is that God, when creating the universe, turned into the universe itself. This makes it a slightly less metaphorical version of pantheism, and a more specific version of deism (often referred to as pandeism). Of course, there is no way of proving or disproving this case, as the only possible evidence to support it is existence itself.

Solving One Particular Problem

In many of the cosmological arguments, there is no mention of what God used to make the universe. This is often referred to by the Latin phrase creatio ex materia, creation from existing materials. While creation is often thought as being entirely creatio ex nihilo, or creation from nothing, the central problem is that most analogies, supporting arguments and even the very definition of “cause” itself - all used to support creation - rely exclusively on creatio ex materia examples. The analogy that a painting implies a painter, for example, makes no reference to the fact that it also implies paints, pigments, brushes, solvents and a canvas, or whatever tools you wish to visualise as associated with a painting. Panentheism and the interpretation that God turned itself into the universe goes some way to providing an answer to this. “God” in this definition, forms all of or part of the raw materials for the universe, satisfying some degree of an ex materia condition.

Panentheism - RationalWiki

Pandeism is a belief system that can be seen as a combination of deism, where the creator of the universe takes no part in its operation, and pantheism, where the Creator and the universe are one and the same. Pandeism suggests that this Creator (not necessarily a currently worshiped deity) made the universe by becoming the universe.

Pandeists contend that this answers some objections to both deism and pantheism, namely that deism doesn’t explain why a Creator would create, then abandon the universe, and pantheism does not explain where the universe/god originates. Like some pantheists, pandeists see nature and the Creator as synonymous, and that scientific inquiry will reveal the mechanisms by which the universe/god operates.

Pandeism - RationalWiki

I am a believer in God and therefore have a basis for my belief and some evidence to back it up. Why an eternal animating force? Because God is eternal, God is animating the world, and God is a force (energy, spirit).

Yes to all of the above—except guiding the world towards nothing at all. And, of course—the force is within me.

These are my beliefs and I believe they are true because they rationally explain the unanswered critical questions that have faced mankind for millennia about Christianity and the world in which it operates.

May the force be with you

I know of a person who used to have a very similar way of looking at the world, including this idea of the “New Age elephant”. He used to be some kind of Buddhist. However, different insights led him to abandon this viewpoint. His name is Ellis Potter. He discusses it in a very small (and easy to read) booklet named “Three Theories of Everthing”. I included a link to a Kindle file with the book, I think it will be a nice read if you’re interested.

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OK, Tony, thanks for explaining that. I had never heard of Pandeism before. It certainly is not the God of Christianity who reveals Himself in the Bible, but it’s a free world.

Everyone has to believe something.

Blessings!

@Casper_Hesp

Thank you Casper, I really appreciate your kind gesture in offering the Kindle file with the book. Ellis Potter has some very interesting thought provoking views—I agree with many of his ideas as they are in line with my own worldview. Of course, he hasn’t revealed all of the mysteries of God, therefore, it may seem as though we have contradicting and conflicting views, but that is hardly the case (here’s a link to a lecture he gave). I will definitely purchase a hard copy of the book sometime soon (it fits better for my purposes)—the lecture has already stimulated certain thoughts of how to go about explaining important points regarding the Christian God’s Trinitarian constitution. I’m sure it will be a pleasure to read, thanks again.

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@Find_My_Way

Hi Benjamin, does your disagreement still stand after having made my position clearer to @tokyoguy111 above? Obviously, for me as well, the God which created the Heavens and the Earth is the same God that led the Israelites out of Egypt and the same God that died on the cross at Golgotha, rising 3 Days later since I also believe, as you do, that a part (or all) of the eternal animating force became the physical manifestation of the universe. Remember, this is one of your statements here from the topic—Prayer and the Arrogance of Believers;

“I have also read that He is not a Man but an all encompassing spirit that we live and move and have our own being in. As a result I believe that perhaps God is pure energy and used some of Himself to create the matter that has become our physical Universe. I also believe Jesus Christ is God in Human form and thus is also more than simply a spirit.”

What does a biblical position imply if not to enlighten and clarify God’s Creation and God’s plan for planet earth and mankind? Isn’t this the primary purpose of the scriptures? Therefore, for this enlightenment and clarification to be clearly illustrated the necessary pertinent knowledge must be presented. This knowledge inherently comes from a variety of different sources—essentially from philosophy, theology, and psychology, but also including all the other applicable sciences that have bearing on the issues. However, conventional current methods of inquiry and investigation are not always sufficient or adequate. What is required here is to engage in speculation on humanity’s origins and ultimate destiny. Speculation involves contemplation and conjectural considerations that essentially entail use of the imagination. Occult esoteric philosophies enhance and expand the use of the imagination to allow an individual to peer through the barrier of common ignorance. Here, the tentative explanations that account for the facts can be tested by further investigation to confirm their viability (of course I’m referring to those things which can be tested). I stand by my pronouncements.

All these attributes are found in the Bible, which I maintain is the only way to know about God Today.

However, they are ONLY found in the Bible. There is no extra-biblical evidence for a personal God.

To put it simply and straight forward, you would do well to focus only on the Bible and leave other forms of spirituality/occult practices out of it.